The Doc Talk Show: Women in Cinema
- Feb 1, 2020
- 2 min read
Updated: Feb 6, 2020
Chicago documentary filmmaker Jeff Spitz hosted his new Doc Talk Show event, which was focused on Chicago women filmmakers. The event, titled Camera Women, took place Jan. 30 from 7 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. at Uncommon Ground on 1401 W. Devon Ave.
A group of viewers watch a Music video by Chicago filmmaker Ashley Battle at the Camera women event at Uncommon Ground in Rodgers Park, Chicago / Baher Hussein
The Event focused on the works of five Chicago women filmmakers Ashley Battle, Dana Kupper, Manuela Hung and Mehrnaz Saeed-Vafa, Shuling Yong.
The work shown by the five women ranged from documentary, personal narrative and music videos.
Filmmaker Ashley Battle showed her highly interesting avant-garde music videos that use visual motifs to radically capture the beauty of diversity and sexuality.
Picking Cotton - Fashion Film via Ashley Battle
In the Q and A session, Battle explained how her love for music and film intersect in her work and how she struggles in the film industry as an African American woman, as she usually feels like an outsider in predominantly white spaces.
Mehrnaz Saeed-Vafa talked about similar struggles in her Q and A session.
She specifically mentioned how it was hard for her as an immigrant woman from Iran to find a job in the film industry here in Chicago.
She mentioned that in Iran, her mom was highly westernized and her dad was more traditional, hence why she always felt a clash between two worlds.
Vafa said that her films deal with the conflict she feels between living a western life but having an Eastern upbringing. She often relates her life in Iran before the revolution to her life now in the West.
Her new film, A House Is Not A Home: Wright or Wrong, sold out at the Gene Siskel Film Center both days it was playing. She showed the audience at the Doc Talk Show an exclusive trailer for the film.
Here is a trailer for Vafa's previous work, Jerry and Me.
Jerry and Me via Mehrnaz Saeed - Vafa
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